Dealer fills niche with new, used forklifts

Drive into Street Toyota on South Georgia Street and scores of models with different options will greet you.

Roll up on Shoppa's Material Handling's gravel parking lot at 6100 S. Washington St. and find nearly 20 used Toyota forklifts for sale.

The orange and black lifts are "certified used," similar to a used car. The options vary as much as those on a sedan or SUV.

The lifting capacity starts at a ton-and-a-half and goes up to 10,000 pounds. Some can stack objects more than 20 feet. They run on unleaded fuel, diesel, both or are powered by electricity.

A forklift, like a car, can have a standard or automatic transmission.

Want an enclosed cab for outside work? Just ask.

Heating and air, a fan - windshield wipers? No problem.

What's not available?

"I haven't seen one with a CD player yet," Shoppa's operations manager Tom Hogan said.

Forklift tires are a significant portion of the company's business. Forklifts might come equipped with static-free tires - that is, tires that won't create a spark and start a fire - white, nonmarking tires for floors that can't be scratched, solid rubber tires that don't go flat or easy-to-handle tires with tubes like a bicycle's.

Toyota recently unveiled its newest line, the 8-Series. Advances include digital display of the standard gauges, cup and pen holders and a drainage hole in the seat (for when it rains).

A used forklift can cost as little as $5,000 or as much as $35,000 depending on its age, lifting capacity and options - about 75 percent less than a new model.

"A lot of people don't use forklifts every day," Shoppa's sales manager Sam Peters said, so dealers like Shoppa's rent forklifts to customers, then sell them later at a reduced cost.

"We rent them out and get our revenue, then put them up for sale," Hogan said.

Company officials wouldn't say how many used and new forklifts it sells or how much business the Amarillo store generates, but Peters said Shoppa's five stores in Texas sold a total of 1,300 new and 900 used forklifts last year - an aggregate of more than one per store per day.

"There's quite a demand," Peters said.

Shoppa's other stores are in Fort Worth, Brownwood, Wichita Falls and Lubbock.

In Amarillo, Shoppa's faces competition from five other companies that also sell, lease and rent forklifts, such as Medley Material Handling, 1501 N.E. Third Ave.; ASCO, 7576 E. Interstate 40; and Western Forklift & Supply, 6100 S. Highway 1541.

Many customers are small businesses that just have a single forklift. Those include places such as marble and rock ranches and wood and lumber yards.

Shoppa's said Bell Helicopter is its biggest customer. Other major accounts include American Airlines, meat packers and cotton gins.